Anion-exchange superporous cellulose (DEAE-SC) and microporous cellulose (DEAE-MC) adsorbents were packed in an electrochromatographic column, and the effect of external electric field (eEF) on the dynamic adsorption was investigated. The column was designed to provide longitudinal, transverse or 2-dimensional (2D) eEF. It was found that the electro-kinetic effect caused by the introduction of an electric field played an important role in the dynamic adsorption of bovine serum albumin to the adsorbents. The dynamic binding capacity (DBC) in the presence of 2D eEF was higher than in the presence of a one-dimensional eEF. The effect of flow velocity on the DBC of the two adsorbents was also demonstrated. It was found that the effect of electric field on the DEAE-MC column was more remarkable than that on the DEAE-SC column at the same flow rate, whereas the DEAE-SC column showed higher DBC and adsorption efficiency (AE) than the DEAE-MC column. With increasing flow rate, the DEAE-SC column could still offer high DBC and AE in the presence of the 2D eEF. For example, a DBC of 21.4 mg/mL and an AE of 57.7% were obtained even at a flow rate as high as 900 cm/h. The results indicate that the 2D electrochromatography packed with the superporous cellulose adsorbent is promising for high-speed protein chromatography.

Aerobic digestion of starch industry wastewater was carried out in an inverse fluidized bed bioreactor using low-density (870 kg/m³) polypropylene particles. Experiments were carried out at different initial substrate concentrations of 2250, 4475, 6730, and 8910 mg COD/L and for various hydraulic retention times (HRT) of 40, 32, 24, 16, and 8 h. Degradation of organic matter was studied at different organic loading rates (OLR) by varying the HRT and the initial substrate concentration. From the results it was observed that the maximum COD removal of 95.6% occurred at an OLR of 1.35 kg COD/(m³·d) and the minimum of 51.8% at an OLR of 26.73 kg COD/(m³·d). The properties of biomass accumulation on the surface of particles were also studied. It was observed that constant biomass loading was achieved over the entire period of operation.

Studies on simultaneous saccharification and fermentation (SSF) of wheat bran flour, a grain milling residue as the substrate using coculture method were carried out with strains of starch digesting Aspergillus niger and nonstarch digesting and sugar fermenting Kluyveromyces marxianus in batch fermentation. Experiments based on central composite design (CCD) were conducted to maximize the glucose yield and to study the effects of substrate concentration, pH, temperature, and enzyme concentration on percentage conversion of wheat bran flour starch to glucose by treatment with fungal α-amylase and the above parameters were optimized using response surface methodology (RSM). The optimum values of substrate concentration, pH, temperature, and enzyme concentration were found to be 200 g/L, 5.5, 65°C and 7.5 IU, respectively, in the starch saccharification step. The effects of pH, temperature and substrate concentration on ethanol concentration, biomass and reducing sugar concentration were also investigated. The optimum temperature and pH were found to be 30°C and 5.5, respectively. The wheat bran flour solution equivalent to 6% (w/V) initial starch concentration gave the highest ethanol concentration of 23.1 g/L after 48 h of fermentation at optimum conditions of pH and temperature. The growth kinetics was modeled using Monod model and Logistic model and product formation kinetics using Leudeking-Piret model. Simultaneous saccharificiation and fermentation of liquefied wheat bran starch to bioethanol was studied using coculture of amylolytic fungus A. niger and nonamylolytic sugar fermenting K. marxianus.

This research was conducted to investigate the biooxidation and copper dissolution from raw low-grade refractory copper sulphide ores located in the Xinjiang Autonomous Region of China using adapted Thiobacillus ferrooxidans bacteria. In order to accelerate the bioleaching rate, the adapted mixed bacteria and silver ion catalyst were tested in the leach columns at laboratory scale. The overall acid consumption was 4.3 kg sulphuric acid per kg of dissolved copper and was linearly related to the percent copper dissolution. The calculated copper dissolution rates obey the Shrinking Core Model. The relative activation energy of the whole biooxidative leaching stages was calculated to be 48.58 kJ/mol.

The spherulites of the short carbon fiber(SCF)/poly (trimethylene terephthalate) (PTT) composites formed in limited space at designed temperatures, and their melting behaviors were studied by the polarized optical microscopy, atomic force microscopy (AFM), and scanning electron microscopy (SEM), respectively. The results suggest that SCF content, isothermal crystallization temperatures, and the film thicknesses influence the crystal morphology of the composites. The dimension of the spherulites is decreased with increasing SCF content, but whether banded or nonbanded spherulites will form in the composites is not dependent on SCF content. However, the crystal morphology of the composites depends strongly on the temperature. When the isothermal crystallization temperatures increase from 180°C to 230°C, the crystal morphology of SCF/PTT composites continuously changes in the following order: nonbanded → banded → nonbanded spherulites. Discontinuous circle lines form in the film when the film thickness increases from 30 to 60 μm. Basing on the SEM observation, it is found that these circle lines are cracks formed due to the constriction difference of the different parts of the spherulites. These cracks are formed when the film is cooled from the isothermal crystallization temperature to the room temperature at a slow cooling rate; while they will disappear gradually at different temperatures in the heating process. The crack will appear/disappear first around the center of the spherulite when the film was cooled/heated. The nontwisted or slightly twisted lamellas will reorganize to form highly twisted lamellas inducing apparent banded texture of the spherulites.

With the rapid development of membrane technology in water treatment, there is a growing demand for membrane products with high performance. The inorganic hollow fiber membranes are of great interest due to their high resistance to abrasion, chemical/thermal degradation, and higher surface area/volume ratio therefore they can be utilized in the fields of water treatment. In this study, the alumina (Al₂O₃) hollow fiber membranes were prepared by a combined phase-inversion and sintering method. The organic binder solution (dope) containing suspended Al₂O₃ powders was spun to a hollow fiber precursor, which was then sintered at elevated temperatures in order to obtain the Al₂O₃ hollow fiber membrane. The dope solution consisted of polyethersulfone (PES), N-methyl-2-pyrrolidone (NMP) and polyvinylpyrrolidone (PVP), which were used as polymer binder, solvent and additive, respectively. The prepared Al₂O₃ hollow fiber membranes were characterized by a scanning electron microscope (SEM) and thermal gravimetric analysis (TG). The effects of the sintering temperature and Al₂O₃/PES ratios on the morphological structure, pure water flux, pore size and porosity of the membranes were also investigated extensively. The results showed that the pure water flux, maximum pore size and porosity of the prepared membranes decreased with the increase in Al₂O₃/PES ratios and sintering temperature. When the Al₂O₃/PES ratio reached 9, the pure water flux and maximum pore size were at 2547 L/m²·h and 1.4 μm, respectively. Under 1600°C of sintering temperature, the pure water flux and maximum pore size reached 2398 L/(m²·h) and 2.3 μm, respectively. The results showed that the alumina hollow fiber membranes we prepared were suitable for the microfiltration process. The morphology investigation also revealed that the prepared Al₂O₃ hollow fiber membrane retained its’asymmetric structure even after the sintering process.

The effect of kinetics and shape factor on barium sulfate precipitation in a continuous stirred tank has been investigated numerically through solving the standard momentum and mass transport equations in combination with the moment equations for crystal population balance. The numerical method was validated with the literature data. The simulated results include the distribution of the local supersaturation ratio in the reactor, the mean crystal size, and the coefficient of variation. The simulation results show that the value of shape factor used in the model affected greatly the mean crystal size and the moments of the crystal size distribution. The influence of the kinetic expressions on the simulation is also analyzed. It is important to investigate the relationship of the shape factor with the precipitator type and other operation conditions to obtain reliable simulation results and suitable kinetic equations of crystal nucleation and growth rates.

6-Aminopenicillanic acid (6-APA) is a crucial pharmaceutical intermediate in the chemistry of semi-synthetic antibiotics. The focused beam reflectance measurement (FBRM) technology and particle vision measurement (PVM) technology were employed to the processes of online-monitoring of 6-APA crystallization behavior in a double-feeding semi-batch crystallizer. Experiments were carried out with four kinds of double-feeding policies and the results were compared with the traditional single-feeding. Records and analysis of FBRM indicated that the nucleation of double feeding policy was much higher than single policy, and chord length of 6-APA was almost determined and had little change after the nucleation peak. Ostwald ripening process had no significant effect on further growth of 6-APA crystal. PVM images showed that the crystal habit of 6-APA was continuously changed during the crystallization process. The development of (002) face in the final crystal for the five feeding policies were different.

A new hybrid drying technique by combining microwave and forced convection drying within a rotary drum, i.e., microwave rotary drying, was developed with the purpose to improve the uniformity of microwave drying. In a laboratory microwave rotary dryer, rewetted soybean was utilized as experimental material to study the effects of drum rotating speed, ventilation flow rate, and specific microwave power on the drying kinetics and cracking ratio of soybean. It was found that, with rotation, the cracking ratio can be lowered but without distinct improvement in the drying rate. Increasing ventilation flow rate and specific microwave power can improve the drying rate, but the cracking ratio also increases as a negative result. The cracking ratio lower than 10% can be attained for ventilation flow rate lower than 2.0 m³·h^-1 or specific microwave energy lower than 0.4 kW·kg^-1 in the present experiments.

A computational fluid dynamics (CFD) simulation that coupled an established heat and mass transfer model was carried out for the air-gap membrane distillation (AGMD) of NaCl solution to predict mass and heat behaviors of the process. The effects of temperature and flowrate on fluxes were first simulated and compared with available experimental data to verify the approach. The profiles of temperature, temperature polarization factor, and mass flux adjacent to the tubular carbon membrane surface were then examined under different feed Reynolds number in the computational domain. Results show that the temperature polarization phenomena can be reduced, and mass flux can be enhanced with increase in the feed Reynolds number.

We investigated the effect of HMT (hexamethylenetetraamine) on the anodic growth of TiO₂ nanotube arrays. The tube length increases to 4.3 μm with HMT concentration increasing to 0.04 mol·L^-1. Adsorption of HMT on the TiO₂ surface is shown to markedly decrease the chemical dissolution rate of tube mouth, resulting in longer nanotube length. Furthermore, Pt nanoparticles were successfully deposited on the surface of TiO₂ nanotubes by ac electrodeposition method. The TiO₂/Pt composites were characterized by field emission scanning electron microscope (FESEM), X-ray photoelectron spectra (XPS), and photoelectrochemistry. An enhancement in photocurrent density has been achieved upon modification of TiO₂ nanotubes with Pt nanoparticles.

A series of new benzimidazole derivatives were designed and synthesized. Their chemical structures were testified by ¹H NMR, infrared spectroscopy (IR), mass spectrography (MS), and elemental analysis. Their potent antiviral properties indicated the prospect of new drugs. Compound 13, 16, 18, 19, 21, 22, and 23 were identified as novel antivirus with much better selective activity and inhibitory activity than the comparable ribavirin against Coxsackie virus B₃ in VERO cells.

The epoxidation of linear terminal olefins with metalloporphyrins in the presence of dioxygen and isobutyraldehyde under ambient temperature and atmospheric pressure was investigated. The results show that all olefins could be smoothly converted to epoxides with high selectivities (70%-90%). For the metalloporphyrins with different catalytic activities within 1-hexene epoxidation in the order of Fe>Mn>Co, T(o-Cl)PPFe(Ⅲ)Cl was most effective, with a 41.7% yield and 80.2% selectivity of 1,2-epoxyhexane. Various amounts of catalyst were investigated, and it was found that with only 10 ppm catalyst the yield of 1,2-epoxyhexane and turnover number (TON) could reach up to 41.9% and 41859, respectively.

Two donor-acceptor molecular systems consisted of tetrathiafulvalene (TTF) and fluorescein were designed and synthesized. The target compounds and their key intermediates were characterized by ¹H NMR, mass spectrography, and infrared spectroscopy, respectively. The UV-vis spectra implied intramolecular interaction in their ground state. Fluorescence spectra and fluorescence lifetimes indicated the photoinduced charge transfer (PET) interaction between the TTF and fluorescein units in their excited states.

Polymer-nanoinorganic particles composite membranes present an interesting approach for improving the physical and chemical, as well as separation properties of polymer membranes, because they possess characteristics of both organic and inorganic membranes such as good permeability, selectivity, mechanical strength, thermal stability and so on. The preparations and structures of polymer-nanoinorganic particles composite membranes and their unique properties are reviewed.

Some metal oxides modified with sulfate ions form highly acidic or superacidic catalysts. SO42-/MxOy solid superacid catalysts, play a vital role in more and more fields such as organic synthesis, fine chemicals, pharmaceuticals, and means for strengthening environmental safeguards. This review highlights the recent development of solid superacid catalysts based on SO42-/MxOy, including synthesis method, characterization of acid sites and acid strength, and applications.